Riding The Brakes
by ArentYouSophiaLoren-8887
Summary: Eli's frightening loss of control reminds Clare that she can never quite trust the person she loves most in the world. ONESHOT.


**Author's Note: Old piece that I took down, but I'm reposting, because in the end, I just could not bear to part with this one. It was one of my favorites, and a lot of people have told me that they wished I kept this one up, so if you encouraged me to repost, thank you, you are wonderful for believing in me when I can't do that for myself.**

**I'm sorry I've been driving people nuts with all the taking down/reposting lately. And sorry to anyone who follows me on Twitter and watched my little meltdown over the past couple days. It's been a rough summer, and I'm trying not to puke my feelings over the internet so much, but sometimes, you have to let it out somehow, or you'll explode.**

**Sorry I turned this author's note into my own diary. **

**I don't own Degrassi, but I do own Dylan & Emily, so don't take them. **

**I.**

Clare sat on the back porch of her mother's house, watching her children play in the yard. She loved bringing her kids to her mother's – she had bought this house specifically with her grandchildren in mind (although at the time, there had only been one grandchild, and he had been hardly old enough to enjoy any outdoor activity) and it was the perfect getaway when she didn't want to handle the hassle and crowds of the park. Helen had bought enough Little Tykes to probably clear out the entire warehouse- the kids had a miniature sandbox, a plastic log cabin with windows that opened and a table that folded down, a foot-controlled car, and a slide.

Right now, Dylan was sitting in the empty sandbox, having cleared out all the toys and dumped them into the grass. He sat in the sand with his Thomas the Tank Engine set her father had given him for Christmas, methodically creating a figure-8 in the sand.

Emily sat in the grass nearby, shredding weeds with her chubby fingers. Her tiny face was screwed up in concentration as she pulled each of the leaves off the stems, then began tearing the stem into little pieces.

A shadow passed over her, and Clare looked up, Eli's face inches above her own. "Hey," she said.

He flicked the hair away from her eyes lazily. "Hey yourself," he said back, taking a seat beside her.

"What's Dylan doing?" he asked.

"Apparently re-creating the entire American railroad system," she said. "He loves those trains."

Emily had finished shredding the weeds and was now toddling her way across the backyard towards the sandbox. Plopping down amongst the toys strewn around her, she grabbed a plastic shovel and immediately shoved it in her mouth.

Clare sighed. "Should she have that in her mouth?"

"Probably not," Eli said. "We should break her of the whole 'putting pole-shaped objects in her mouth' fetish. You know, before it gets out of hand."

She swatted him with the back of her hand. "Don't be gross," she chided.

He smirked.

Apparently bored of chewing on the edge of the plastic, Emily tossed at aside, then glanced over at her brother, silently absorbed in his little train world. She toddled over the edge of the sandbox, standing beside her brother, peering at the train set over his shoulder. Reaching over, Emily bent down to grab one of the trains, picking it up and spinning the wheels with her tiny fingers.

Moving so quickly that it caught Clare completely off-guard, Dylan suddenly leapt up and shoved Emily in the chest so hard that she stumbled backward. Her foot caught on the edge of the sandbox and she fell back into the grass, smacking the back of her head on the edge of a bucket.

For a moment, she lay there, stunned, and Clare knew what was coming before her daughter even got her breath back. After a pause, Emily's voice ripped through the air as if someone had cranked the stereo on the car, howling so loudly that she was choking on her sobs.

Clare rushed across the lawn, scooping Emily into her arms. Her daughter wailed decibels into her ear, making them ring.

"Shh, shh, sweetie, it's okay, shh," she soothed, rubbing the back of her head. When Clare drew her hand back, she was startled to see blood there. "Oh, god," she whispered.

Clare watched Dylan, staring at them from inside the sandbox, but not looking very penitent. Instead, he just stood there, the train that Emily had grabbed in his hand. Clare was about to open her mouth to yell at him, when out of nowhere Eli appeared, snatching their son by the arm so hard that Dylan yelped in pain.

"What the hell were you doing?" Eli shouted directly in his face, and to her shock, he smacked him across the cheek with an open palm, the sound causing her to wince. Dylan's mouth rounded into a perfect O of surprise and hurt, causing tears to spring to his eyes.

Eli grabbed him by the shoulders, staring him hard in the face. "Don't you ever do something like that, ever," he said harshly.

Dylan was crying by this point, earnest sobs that were almost as loud as his sister had been – Emily had suddenly stopped screaming when she heard the furious tone of her father's voice. Storming past Dylan, Eli snatched Emily out of Clare's arms and headed inside the house without turning back to look or speak to either of them.

Dylan was crying in earnest now, his shoulders shaking and his breathing ragged as he sobbed.

Clare knelt down and reached her palm gently to his face, and Dylan let out a yelp, as if he expected his mother to hit him. She pulled him close to her, cupping the back of his head in her hands, running her fingers through his hair.

"Shhh," she said quietly, rocking him in her squatting position. "Shhhh, honey, it's okay."

When he finally stopped crying, Clare pulled back and looked him in the eyes. "You know you did a bad thing. You don't hit your sister, ever."

He just stared at her, his eyes dark and hooded. He was staring at her with a gaze filled with suspicion and wariness, as if he isn't sure she is a friend or foe. Like he's never seen her before, and she wasn't his mother.

Taking his hand, she led him into the house through the kitchen door. Blessedly, Eli was nowhere to be found, and she couldn't hear him or Emily.

She pushed open the door to the spare bedroom. "Stay in here until dinner," she instructed him, shutting the door behind her.

He stood in the room as the door swings shut behind him, completely immobile, a stone gargoyle. Waiting a moment to make sure he didn't try and leave, she searched the house for Eli and Emily.

She found them in her mother's upstairs bathroom, Emily sitting on the countertop with her shirt off and Eli pressing a washcloth to the back of her head.

"How's my girl doing?" Clare asked, trying to keep her voice light.

Emily and Eli turned to face her, two identical pairs of green eyes. Emily's were rimmed with red and swollen from crying. She was still sniffling slightly, but otherwise she'd gone as silent as her brother, as stiff as a board while Eli applied the wet rag to her skull.

Eli's face was still hardened and stormy, his lips pursed tight together, his face red. "It's not a bad cut," he said, more to himself than to her. "It's long, which was why there was a lot of blood, but it's not very deep. She probably won't need stitches. Good. Saves us a trip to the ER."

Clare stared at him, then fixed a wide smile on her face for Emily. "Sweetie," she said, "You go downstairs, okay? Mommy and Daddy need to talk about grown-up stuff."

Emily didn't nod or look her way to indicate that she'd heard her, but she slid off the countertop and bolted from the room, as if she couldn't get away from them fast enough. Once she heard her shoes clomping down the hall, Clare turned to Eli, her hands on her hips.

"You mind telling me what the _hell_ that was?" she asked, her voice barely level.

Eli glared at her. "Don't start with me."

"No, you tell me right now! What the hell was that, Eli? You scared the shit out of them!"

"He could have seriously hurt her, Clare! You were watching!"

"That doesn't make it okay to hit him!"

"Well, what were you going to do for punishment?"

"Send him to his room!"

Eli snorted. "Oh, right, like _that_ would deter him. He'd do it again. He needs to learn that it's never okay to do that."

"So it's okay for you to hit people, but not him." Clare shook her head in disbelief. "I can't believe that's the lesson you want to send him."

"The only lesson I'm giving him is that you never just hit someone unless you have a good reason to!"

Clare's mouth hung open. "Are you serious? Please, tell me you're joking. That makes no sense at all."

Eli ignored her, washing some of the blood off the rag in the sink. Clare just stood there, unsure of what else to say.

Eli had never raised a hand to their kids before. His sudden snap had shaken her, and made her realize that his usual control that he had with their family was not so much inborn as it was cultivated. It also served as a reminder that this Eli was not the same Eli she had once known. His actions, so filled with fury, ferocity, and instinctual, swift precision, reminded her how tenuous Eli's grasp on his own self-control was. She could only speculate where it came from.

Whatever the reason, it had sobered her up to the reality that even after all these years – their insane history and their two children they had created – she didn't know him as well as she thought she did.

Speechless, Clare left the bathroom, leaving Eli standing over the sink, the water running aimlessly as he stared intently at the blood running down the drain.

**II.**

Breakfast the next morning was the most somber affair Clare could remember ever having. The air was so tense and heavy she felt as if somebody had actually died. Dylan sat at the table, refusing her effort to put any food in his mouth, despite the fact that he hadn't eaten anything since lunchtime yesterday and hadn't spoken a word since that afternoon. Emily sat in her high chair, eating cereal with her hands, but even she was quiet, picking up on the mood.

The sound of padded feet came from the hallway, and Eli appeared in the door, brushing his hair out of his eyes. Immediately, Clare saw Dylan tense in his chair, his fingers gripping the table so tightly they were turning white.

"Dylan, why don't you go upstairs and put your bathing suit on," she said. "We'll go down to the pool before lunch."

Dylan slid out of his seat and walked towards the door with his head down, giving his father a wide berth. Eli didn't make eye contact with him. Sighing, he kissed Emily on the top of her hair, lifting her into his arms and resting her on his hip as he poured himself a cup of coffee.

Clare sidled up beside him. She didn't want to bring up the elephant in the room, but things wouldn't smooth out until they had. "So about yesterday," she began, not knowing how else to start.

"Clare," Eli said, his voice husky. He wasn't looking at her, but out the kitchen window at their driveway. "Don't. Please. Not now."

"Eli, I need to know what happened."

"Well, I don't," he snapped, rounding on her momentarily before backing off. Startled, she took a step back.

"I don't know what happened," he said softly. His face was red. "I really don't know what came over me. It just…happened."

Clare nodded her head. "Well, will it happen again?"

He shook his head firmly, still staring out the window. "No. I can promise you that."

"How can you promise me that, Eli? You don't even know what it was. How can you keep it from happening?"

"I just will," he said, looking her directly in the eyes. "It won't happen again."

Clare looked at him, opening her mouth and then closing it again. She did want to believe him, but he had startled her so much that she suddenly remembered why she had initially had such a hard time trusting him when they had been just kids. He was unpredictable, and you never really knew _what_ he was thinking. For a moment there, he had gone from the man she loved to the teenager who had seriously scared her from time to time.

So instead of answering him, she just turned and walked away, leaving him standing in her wake. Let him know she wasn't going to trust him again so easily.


End file.
